The impact of education and digitalization on female labour force participation in BRICS: an advanced panel data analysis

Abstract

The present study empirically elucidates the interconnections between digitalization and FLFP in BRICS economies. Furthermore, we also assessed the influence of three essential economic indicators on FLFP, i.e., education, fertility and GDP. We used annual data from 1990 to 2020 and advanced panel estimation techniques such as Banerjee and Crrion-i-Selvestre cointegration, slope heterogeneity, and cross-sectional augmented autoregressive distributed lags model to effectuate these objectives. The study’s empirical results illustrate the existence of a positive interconnection between digitalization and FLFP in sample countries. In addition, education and GDP play an essential role in furthering FLFP in the long run. A similar interconnection is observed in the short period. However, the magnitude of the short-run impacts is smaller than the long-run impacts. The empirical analysis offers a few pertinent policy insights for policymakers to improve the situation in the selected sample.